The Dark Abode: an Oriya novel by Sarojini Sahoo

Selina Hossain

(The Dark Abode (ISBN 978-81-906956-2-6) is a collage presentation of south Asian feminist novelist Sarojini Sahoo ‘s novel and American poet / painter Ed Baker’s 23 sketches and was first written in Oriya and was published in 2005 from Time Pass Publication, Bhubaneswar under the title Gambhiri Ghara and in 2007, it was translated in to Bengali by Dilwar Hossain and Morshed Shafiul Hossain as Mithya Gerosthali (ISBN No :984 404 287-9 ) and was published from Bangladesh by Anupam Prakashani , Dhaka . In 2008 it was published in English by Indian Age Communication, Vadodara and was translated by Mahendra Kumar Dash. In 2010, Prameela K.P. translated it in to Malayalam and Chintha Publisher of Thiruvanthapuram published it with a title Irunda Koodaram)

( Selina Hossain is one of the most important women writers of Bangladesh. She has published twenty-one novels, seven collections of short stories, four collections of prose writings and four collections of stories for children. Her works are a moving account of the contemporary social and political crises and conflicts as well as the recurrent cycles of the life of the struggling masses. Quite a few of her novels have been translated into Indian regional languages and into French, Russian and English. She is the winner of Bangla Academy award, 1980 and Alaol Purashkar, 1981 among many others. In 1994-95 she won a Ford Foundation Fellowship for her novel, Gayatri Sandhya. Selina Hossain is currently serving in the position of Director of the Bangla Academy in Dhaka.)

Sarojini Sahoo is a remarkable writer of Oriya language. She is known as one of the first ranking feminist writers of India. Known mainly as a fiction writer, she usually writes in Odiya. But on feminist issues she regularly writes essays. She has authored five novels and seven collections of short stories. Translation of her short stories in English, titled Sarojini Sahoo: Short Stories, has been published from Kolkata. She has received quite a few awards like Orissa Sahitya Akademi award, Bhubaneshwar Book fair award, Prajatantra award and few more. Quite a few of her short stories have been translated in Bangla and published from Bangladesh. Sarojini has already been known to readers of Bangladesh.

Sarojini Sahoo’s feminist outlook is quite sharp. She raises the issues differently in her different writings. And such issues are introduced in her creative writings without sullying the art of literature.

The story of ‘The Dark Abode’ seems at the beginning to be a tale of strong love affair which the writer has contrived using the latest technology. The loved one is an Indian who has her husband and child. Her lover is a Pakistani. He too has wife and children. So it is a case of illicit love affair. The lovers have not seen each other. The bridge of communication between them is e-mail.

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